Unregistered sex offender busted on subway

Richard WeirWednesday, September 26, 2012

VINCENT HOWARD LUCAS

A 49-year-old Lowell man, nabbed Monday for failing to register as a sex offender after an Orange Line rider told police he was taking pictures of kids on a subway car in Jamaica Plain, was taken back to Lowell yesterday and ordered to enroll in the statewide registry, officials said.

When a T cop asked Vincent Howard Lucas why he was snapping photos of schoolchildren aboard the train at 6:50 a.m. Monday, Lucas “told the officer he had just gotten a new phone and was playing around with it,” according to Transit Police Superintendent-in-Chief Joseph O’Connor.

O’Connor said the officer detained Lucas after a passenger aboard the train reported she had seen him snapping pictures of kids and became alarmed.

“He didn’t make any comments about the allegation,” O’Connor said, adding, “The officer was not satisfied with the explanation and he did a background check and found out that Lucas had failed to register as a sex offender.”

O’Connor said the passenger’s tip to police is another “good example” of a rider engaging in the MBTA’s “See Something, Say Something” campaign and helping serve as “eyes and ears of Transit Police.”